Books Coming Soon 2020

National Museum Of African American Music opening The End Of 2019

Rendering Courtesy of The National Museum of African American Music

 

The National Museum of African American Music is set to open near the end of 2019 on a date to be announced; a grand-opening ceremony will follow in 2020 in Nashville Tennessee

The museum is slated to occupy a 56,000-square-foot corner of the mixed-use Fifth + Broadway development, facing Bridgestone Arena on one side and the Ryman on the other. CEO Henry Beecher Hicks III and his team are focused on making the museum a place to look closely at the threads of black musicians’ influence and to follow them in the many directions they extend.

To serve that mission, the museum’s exhibits will be organized into five galleries. “Wade in the Water” tells the story of gospel music and its evolution into soul and other related genres, while “Crossroads” outlines the blues’ history and its effects on a huge variety of music. “A Love Supreme” traces the deep roots of jazz, while “One Nation Under a Groove” looks at R&B and its myriad offshoots, from funk to techno and beyond. “The Message” looks at how hip-hop became an integral part of the past four decades of popular music. 

Rendering Courtesy of The National Museum of African American Music

The story is massive, so patrons will have some navigational help from an app called Rivers of Rhythm (preview it at rofr.nmaam.org). It’s similar to a streaming music service — users can choose an artist, and the app will suggest other musicians to check out: those who influenced that artist, as well as others who were inspired by their work. 

The museum has about 1,000 artifacts in its collection now and expects to have some 1,400 by the time it opens. Items displayed at a media preview in August included movie posters, instruments and stage costumes.

In addition, some 25 technology-enhanced interactive features are planned, including one that will allow visitors to sing in a choir (with a little green-screen magic) under the direction of Nashville gospel legend Dr. Bobby Jones.

Hidden Figures

Hidden Figures, a biographical film about the African-American women who worked at NASA in the 1950s and 60s.

African American Newspapers

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Tribute African American Mathematicians

Lewis Latimer (1848 – 1928)

What He Invented: The Carbon Filament For The Light Bulb. In 1876, he worked with Alexander Graham Bell to draft the drawings required for the patent of Bell’s telephone.

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                                             David Harold Blackwell

Born: April 24, 1919; place: Centralia, Illinois

AB (1938) University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign; AM (1939) University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign

Ph.D. (1941) Statistics, University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign
thesis: Some Properties of Markoff Chains; Advisor: Joseph L. Doob

: Professor Emeritas of Statistics, University of California at Berkeley

Research Interests: Mathematics, David Blackwell is, to mathematicians, the most famous, perhaps greatest, African American Mathematician. He earned his Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics in 1938, Master of Arts in Mathematics in 1939, and his Ph.D. in 1941 (at the age of 22), all from the University of Illinois. He is the seventh African American to receive a Ph.D. in Mathematics. He is the first and only African American to be any one of: a member of the National Academy of Sciences, a President of the American Statistical Society, and a Vice President of the America Mathematics Society.

 

J. Ernest Wilkins, Jr.

in 1998

Born: November 27, 1923 Birthplace: Chicago, Illinois

A.B. Mathematics (1940) Uiversity of Chicago; M.s. Mathematics (1941).

Ph.D. Mathematics (1942) University of Chicago
thesis: Multiple Integral Problems in Parametric Form in the Calculus of Variations; Advisor: Magnus Hestenes

additional degrees: Bachelors of Mechanical Engineering (1957) New York University; Masters of Mechanical Engineering (1960) New York University

Research Interests: Mathematics, Applied Mathematics, Physics, Nuclear Engineering

Clark Atlanta University

 

At the age of 13 in 1936, Jesse Ernest Wilkins, Jr. entered college at the University of Chicago and at 17, received his A.B. in Mathematics and ranked in the top 10 in Mathematics’ famous undergraduate Putnam Competition. At the age of 19, in 1942, he became the seventh African American to obtain a Ph.D. in Mathematics (from the University of Chicago). He was described in national newspapers as “the Negro genius.” After working as a mathematician for many years, Dr. Wilkins sought to get some practical education. Wilkins was the second African American to be named to the National Academy of Engineering.

Dr. Mark Dean

Computer Inventions

Obtained a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Tennessee, a masters degree in electrical engineering from Florida Atlantic University and a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Stanford. He is one of the most prominent black inventors in the field of computers.

Dr. Mark Dean started working at IBM in 1980 and was instrumental in the invention of the Personal Computer (PC). He holds three of IBM’s original nine PC patents and currently holds more than 20 total patents. The famous African-American inventor never thought the work he was doing would end up being so useful to the world, but he has helped IBM make instrumental changes in areas ranging from the research and application of systems technology circuits to operating environments. He was chief engineer of the 12-person team that designed the original IBM PC in the early ’80s, earning him three of the nine original patents for that device. One of his most recent computer inventions occurred while leading the team that produced the 1-Gigahertz chip, which contains one million transistors and has nearly limitless potential

 

Birth Of A Nation

Nate Parker, is the director/actor/writer/producer behind the slavery drama The Birth of Nation. The story of how literate slave and preacher Nat Turner ultimately orchestrated a rebellion in 1831 set a new festival record when it sold to Fox Searchlight for $17.5 million.

The rights to the slave rebellion drama The Birth of a Nation, which premiered Monday afternoon in Park City to multiple standing ovations, have been picked up by Fox Searchlight at the Sundance Film Festival for $17.5 million, The Hollywood Reporter confirmed.

Searchlight beat escalating bids from Weinstein Co., Netflix (which insisted on a day-and-date theatrical and streaming debut), Paramount and other suitors. Nate Parker wrote, directed and stars in the project, which is based on the story Nat Turner, an American-born slave who led the most successful slave rebellion in American history.

Parker said, “You can watch this film and see there are systems that were in place that were corrupt and corrupted people. And the legacy of that still lives with us.”

Celebrating Black History Month

 

 

Zora & Langston

Norton’s Amy Cherry bought the  North American rights to Yuval Taylor’s Zora and Langston  from William Clark, at William Clark Associates. The nonfiction work explores the friendship between Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes; Clark said it tracks their bond from their first meeting in New York City, through a road trip across the South, leading up to a bitter falling out. Taylor is a senior editor at Chicago Review Press and Cherry published his previous two books.